The Abilene reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1883-1888, 1887-09-01

|
mamma is"
Except when Mr. Poindexter comes.
| And then wish she was-further."
''No; it's contenting to look at her. She's
an object of pleasure to the eye. What
| eyes hers are, too-those soft blue-gray
| eyes, like great jewels, half veiled in their
black lashesl And what a tea-rose skin it
| is And her figure, and the way she walks
! she is like some one you read of; she's my
| ideal Of woman
You're her darling. She had you in
possession an hour before she had me,
| that's the reason. Still, it is true that II
we only had mammals shape, and her COM
plexion and her eyes-but then she's not
! done with her eyes yet" said Iris, with a
satirical emphasis.
swell, there are not many girls who have
| such mother, any way"
II should hope not" said Iris. ''lts
| mighty uncomfortable having a person
| who's not too old to be your companion, and
! who yet holds such authority over you as to
tell you when to go to bed"
"Why, Iris, shouldn't think you were
fond of mamma at an.'
Fond of her? I'm as fond as most girls
are. But mamma is $3.50 exasperatingly
young, it really isn't respectable" And
Just then the door opened, and mamma
came in.
But l may as well tell you here that
couldn't help agreeing with Iris, if it was
undutiful; mamma was so eXasperating.
And as for that's being undutiful, you
couldn't feel the sense of duty to any one
so entirely your companion, except nova
then when she put on her imperial gar
ments. To be sure she was only seventeen
years older than the youngest of Us, silly as
that was. But it's the truth. And l was
the youngest, and just seventeen myself.
But it did use to seem to US that, being our
mother, like ell other girls mothers, she
was already old as any mother, too old to
think of without disagreeable sensations,
and we wondered what she had to look for
ward to, and sometimes we pltied her lit
tie, feeling as if really she had nothing but
the end of ali things before her, and that
all the happiness she could hope for lay in
our affairs. We regretted that her hair
wasn't gray, just as matter OF propriety.
1t seemed an assumption of youth an affec-
tation, that she should still have her own
teeth, and just as as if made of nice
pearl, too. And her complexion was absurd;
every body must suppose she painted,
with that rich color; and why in the
world she still wanted pretty things to
wear passed our understanding-at least,
you know, Iris and mine; Prim never quite
sided with US, although sometimes she had
reason to be a little disturbed about it all
herself. When Uncle Melvyn sent home
to mamma that white Grape shawl, lovely
as cloud, felt sure that if he had only
known how we had grown up he never
would have sent it to mamma, almost an
Jo,.Ir Foa - 46o
Somehow Iris and l didn't like to say a
great deal about it, but it was really pain
full to US that mamma had such gay and
youthful manners; that she laughed like
chime of bells, quite as if she had never
grown old; that she absorbed so much of
the conversation when callers came. We
did wish she could conduct herself in a
way more becoming her years, and we re-
solved that when we were nearly thirty
five, as she was, we would try and remem-
ber the dignity that ought to come at that
period Of life, especially after having lost
a husband and being the mother Of three
full-grown daughters. And then, too, it
really was mortifying when new acquaint-
ances looked their surprise at mamma,
with her three great girls, to have to let
them form their own conjectures about
her people as being low-bred and ig-
norant, seeing that they had mar
ried her off at fourteen, and she had
been widow since she was seven
teen. Somehow it seemed as if they must
have been backwoods savages to have
allowed such thing, instead of being edu-
Gated and well-to-dO as they were. Really
mamma was ashamed of it herself; perhaps
all the more so that her husband had turned
out tyrant, whose death in three years
after her marriage was relief. You can
judge what a tyrant by his insisting on
calling the twins Primavera and Iris. But
l was born just as he died, and mamma i'm
mediately made use of her liberty to name
me for her mother, plain Sue. He ought to
nave been ashamed to take advantage of
such child anyway, if he was my father,
and that's what L said to mamma. But she
became all at once very lofty, and told me
never to speak in that manner again. And
do you know, quite admired her then, and
wished she was as imperious and proud and
digniied as that always. And yet knew
she could hardly remember papa, and
would have been terrified and unhappy
enough to sink into her grave if he had
come back from his, after all his cruel
treatment of her that she had half forgot
ten now. Somehow | am not sure that his
children did not inherit and carry out his
ideas that way. But should like to know
how you would feel if person coming to
see you should suddenly leave you to wear
the willow, so taken up by your mothers
bloom and sparkle and bright pleasantly,
her smiles and graciousness and all that,
as to forget you were in existence, and
come again and ask for hsri You wouldn't
like it a bit. And neither did Iris and 1.
If mamma had had gray hair and worn
a cap over it, and smooth muslin hand
kerchief on her shoulders, and had dressed
in modified mourning on the street, and
walked slowly, and used glasses, and read
serious books with them good deal, and
left to US the front drawing room when our
friends came, while she darned things in
the back room and wore gloves with the
inger-tips cut off, and had gone to bed
early with a rubber bag of hot water and
maid carrying her shawls and books, and
we opening the door and appearing per-
fectly lovely and solicitous-why then she
would have been about the sort of mother
we should have liked to have.
But there she was, five feet FIVE not a bit
of STOPPING to her round supple figure,
black-haired, and jewel-eyed, and damask-
skinned, and smiling with dimple, and
walking with spring as if the earth were
something elastic; and the more our friends
used to admire her and like to be with her.
the more sure we were that it was nom
sense and make-believe and bore to them,
and it annoyed US beyond measure anyway.
And this annoyance was particularly
poignant when Mr.. Poindexter began to
frequent our house. For every body knew
that Prim and Iris were exceedingly
pretty girls, and that I-well, was plain
Sue, to be sure-but was rather bright,
you know; and he came TO see US;